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Dear Governor Cuomo:

We, the undersigned, are members of New York State’s professional food community. We are chefs, restaurant owners, brewers, winemakers, cidermakers, purveyors, processors, retailers, researchers and farmers. We urge you to ban hydrofracking for shale gas in New York State.

In states where fracking is already taking place, leaks and spills have stunted and killed crops and livestock and sickened humans. Abundant evidence has shown that shale gas extraction is hazardous to air, water and land.

Contamination occurs from methane and toxic fracking chemicals, as well as from the transportation and disposal of toxic — and at times even radioactive — wastewater. Once it occurs it cannot be mitigated or removed from underground aquifers.

This is of great concern to our community because agriculture, food and beverage production, restaurants and tourism are vital, growing, interdependent economic engines that rely on our famously pristine water and farmland for their success.

Governor Cuomo, your leadership in fostering a sustainable green economy and supporting sustainable practices in agriculture, fishing, tourism and food production, not to mention renewable energy, can make our home state an example for the entire country.